Spring burst upon the scene this month, and was I ever glad to see it, as was just about everyone else I know in my part of the southwest, i.e. from the Rockies south thru the Sangre de Cristo mountains to Albuquerque. We had the errant snowfall…like it lost its way then dropped a desultory powdering in a huff. As I write the temperature has today dropped to mid-40s from yesterday’s high 70s; plus, no sign of any other kind of precipitation after the juvenile hail a week or so ago. It’s as though our weather can’t make up its mind. Hey…this is Colorado after all.
But enough kvetching! It’s great to be out in the garden again, the bionic knee behaving like the one I was born with. Frankly, last year was a write off, so in 2025 I’m playing catch-up. To be honest, I do so most years, tho’ I should know better having been awarded a City and Guild’s Certificate of Horticulture some (ahem) decades ago in England. It was there drummed into me that a professional gardener schooled in the old-fashioned mold, has their tools spic and span and sharpened then tucked away, their workspace clean and ordered, a sharpened pencil at hand fill out seed orders, and the garden beds dug over and ready to accept amendments. Yet, here I am. It’s mid-April and I’m speed-cleaning the bench, sorting the tools, never mind cleaning them (now where is that much-loved trowel?), and playing catch-up organizing deliveries of seed and mulch. Ah, well, I could say I have an excuse (The Knee), but it is like this every year. Oh well…
As respite, I flee to my library and looking through the collection I fall upon Beeton’s All About Gardening (Illustrated) Being a Popular Dictionary of Gardening, published c. 1900. It didn’t help. Be advised, the author admonishes, “in every well-planned tool-house there should be contrivances of different sorts for hanging up the tools…which should all be well cleaned before they are put away.” I especially appreciated, “A BENCH (my emphasis) with a vice attached to it will be found very useful in a tool-house; also, a grindstone and hones for the sharpening of different tools.” Those being the ones that have been cleaned and oiled before putting away in their proper places as may be. As for honing…well, my kitchen knives are entirely without merit.
But! I do have a bench that my son built for me from scrap wood gleaned off a building project, and it serves, as does the row of nails hammered into the shed’s wall studs from which the tools that struggle through winter unoiled are hang in suspended animation. Beneath the bench plastic pots gather dust and spiderwebs. You get the picture; I do know better. And this may be the autumn I tidy the shed as well as the garden before winter sets in.
However, it is spring!! We can worry about that stuff later. And this is the Rockies, and it’s April, although winter could still be lurking in the sudden temperature swings, so those decrepit plant pots are kept to hand to shield emerging growth on peonies and irises, while the squeaky, creaky secateurs and loppers serve to tidy up the twigs and branches that I lay loosely over emerging seedlings to fend of springtime’s light frosts. Even old newspapers come in handy for this purpose.
Aperire is the Latin verb meaning “to open” and likely from it came the word Aprilis, and now April, when buds open, leaves unfurl, and nature throws wide the door to renewed life and the fecundity of our world. So, make the most of it and get into the garden…the shed will take care of itself.
To learn more about Hartley’s range of Glasshouses to make it spring all year round:
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And for info on the most important piece(s) of equipment a gardener can aspire to:
https://hartley-botanic.ie/ranges/greenhouse-accessories-ie/